Last 3 games of 2011/12 - the control vs unpredictability dilemna again

The 2010/11 Premier League season is drawing to a close and Evertonians can look forward to visits from two of the top 4 to Goodison, sandwiching a trip to West Brom. First up are Man City who will be hoping for a win to secure their place in the Champions League for next season. Everton then have an opportunity to avenge the 4-1 defeat against West Brom earlier in the season before finally hosting Chelsea on the last day of the season. Depending on results in the meantime the Chelsea game could play a key role in deciding the destination of the league title. I can't stand meaningless final games of the season so really hope this one means something, it would be great to see Everton trampling on Roman's dreams!

Follow, follow, follow, follow: Mikky's back!

Everton's mid-season injury crisis finally seems to be easing and two of the 'big hitters', Cahill and Arteta, returned to the starting line-up against Wigan last week. Whilst allowing for the two players getting up to match speed the match at the DW Stadium was notable for returning to a pattern that has been evident for the majority of the season, but missing in recent weeks. Against Wigan, Everton mounted long periods of pressure on the Wigan goal, winning many corners but rarely actually creating clear cut chances. This pattern was only really broken during the injury crisis when the team were robbed of Arteta, Fellaini, Cahill and Rodwell.

I've talked about this problem all season. Essentially I think it's a dilemna between control and unpredictability. When we have Arteta in the side we have more control, his pass complettion stats show why, but building attacks in a controlled manner is not always a good thing. As we've seen time and again against the lower teams who put more emphasis on defence, it only leads to frustration. Whilst he was injured the players available meant that we played a slightly more direct game which seemed to allow us to dispatch the lower teams more easily, resulting in wins over Fulham, Wolves and Blackburn.

The good news is that the control that Arteta gives us is absolutely neccessary when playing against the top 6 teams. Without it you get performances like our recent one at Old Trafford, where we defend admirably but are subject to wave after wave of attack without being able to muster a clear cut chance of our own. The best little spaniard we know should be in the starting line-up against City today and with our recent records against them I really wouldn't be surprised if we got some kind of result from this. The same applies to the Chelsea game, it'll be the forth time we've played them this season and as yet we haven't lost so there should be some confidence amongst the players.

For next season, whilst buying a new striker will be seen by most as the biggest priority, I actually believe Moyes' most important task will be finding the right balance between control and unpredictability in each game. A one-size-fits-all approach to this doesn't work in the Premier League, so he needs to find a way to dial up and down the players personal style of play to suit the situation. I would say we need to improve the squad to do this, except we've shown we can play both ways this season with players we already have. It might be that Moyes needs to select his line-up to suit the oppo more often, rather than just choosing his best 11 but however he does it, if he can nail this, i reckon we'll have a much better season in 2011/12.